I get tired of Cubs fans reveling in delight at every misfortune Dusty Baker experiences as manager of the Reds, who extended its skipper for 2 more years on Monday.

It seems Cubs fans have developed some sort of self-medicating technique to ease the pain of the past by simply blaming Baker for everything from his 96-loss season in 2005, to the brutal NLCS loss against Florida, to the demise of Mark Prior & Kerry Wood, to just about every other countless Cubs failure during his tenure in Chicago.

Don’t get me wrong, Dusty is responsible for some of that blame. But all of it? Hardly.

The fact of the matter is, nothing will wipe away the heartbreak of coming within five outs of a World Series appearance, or the what-could-have-been careers of Prior & Wood.

But to think of this guy as a bum manager is ridiculous. Baker won 3 NL Manager of the Year Awards before he ever stepped foot into the Cubs’ dugout in 2003…and should’ve won a fourth with the Reds in 2010 (he lost by one vote).

Since taking over the down trodden Reds in 2008, Dusty’s resurrected the franchise to its highest success in 30 years, having won 2 division titles in the past 3 season.

He’s now just one of 6 manager in major league history to have won 3 division titles with 3 different teams (Billy Martin, Tony La Russa, Lou Piniella & Davey Johnson).

No, the playoff success hasn’t been there. And no, Dusty will never be considered a great tactical game manager. But you can’t ignore Baker’s boys love playing for him, or that more often than not, his teams are competing near the top of the league.

Who knows if Baker will ever find enough postseason success to win a world championship. But I hope he does, even if it comes with the division rival Reds while the Cubs are rebuilding (after all, anything is better than another Cardinals championship).

And I understand rooting against Baker may relieve some of your Cubs pain. But isn’t it about time we let the dead bury the dead, move on from Baker’s disappointments, Bartman, Billy Goat Curses, Black Cats and various other hexes as the crux of the Cubs’ postseason futility?

Even if Baker was once the root of all Cubs evil, he no longer is, and hasn’t been for some time. So why keep hating on the man?

Like countless other Cubs managers before him, it didn’t work out, for whatever reasons doesn’t matter. Dusty’s moved on, and as Cubs fans, we should, too.

2 Comments

I’ll forever hold my grudge against Dusty for calling Chicago the most racist city in the country. Cubs fans would have easily embraced Baker as one of its own alongside Michael Jordan, Billy Williams, Fergie Jenkins and others if he had only won. Cubs fans didn’t not like Dusty because of the N word, it was because he didn’t put up enough W’s!

Dusty absolutely would’ve been embraced as one of Chicago’s own had he won the World Series! Of course, that makes him no different that any other Cubs manager!

Is Chicago the most racist city in the country? I don’t think it is. But thinking so doesn’t give the city a free-pass or make the threats on Dusty any more tolerable.

The upsetting part isn’t Baker’s assessment of Chicago as the No.1 racist city in the country…it’s that racial threats even happened to him at all.

What difference does it make if Chicago is the most…second most…or 50th most racist place in the county? We’re not a racist as say, Boston? So that’s okay? Of course, not.

What Dusty says he suffered through at the end of his career in Chicago is embarrassing…inexcusable…no matter how you slice it.

I’ll agree there wasn’t enough winning in the end to keep Baker. That cost him his job, which was fair. But as quickly as this city embraced Dusty, they kicked him while he was down and then ran the man out of town on a rail.

If that’s not enough for Cubs fan, well, I can’t change that. But I don’t understand it, either.